WD starts supplying 24TB HDDs with CMR for data centers and enterprise customers
Western Digital has started shipping its first 24TB HDDs based on conventional magnetic recording. The company is also launching new 28TB SMR HDDs. For the time being, the new drives are mainly intended for use in data centers.
Western Digital introduces its 24TB CMR drive, among others as Ultrastar HC580 variant. According to the manufacturer, the HDD has ten platters of 2.4TB each. The HC580 features, among other things, ‘improved’ OptiNAND. Metadata is stored on it for higher data density. It should also increase the reliability of the drives, as ‘critical metadata’ is stored on the NAND memory in the event of a power failure. The first version of the HC580 has a SATA-3 interface. The HDD thus achieves transfer rates of up to 298MB/s, the manufacturer claims in a data sheet. Early next year, WD will launch a SAS variant.
The manufacturer also comes with a 24TB CRM HDD in its WD Gold series for enterprise driveswrites WD in a press release. This HDD also offers OptiNAND. The company also mentions transfer rates of 298MB/s for this drive. According to the manufacturer, the HDD offers an average time of 2.5 million hours between failures. According to WD, the drive can write up to 550TB per year.
Furthermore, Western Digital is launching a new Ultrastar HC680. That drive has shingled magnetic recording, but has 28TB of storage space. SMR is slower than CMR because the data tracks on the HDD platters are partly over each other with SMR. This can result in higher capacities, but also lower read and write speeds, especially with many random writes. According to WD, these HC680 drives are mainly intended for bulk storage, online backups, video surveillance, cloud storage and other applications where the data is not often accessed. WD has not yet put any concrete specifications of the HC680 online.
The manufacturer also does not share recommended prices for the new drives. Western Digital makes the Gold variant available through its distribution channels. The Ultrastar variants are now only delivered to select customers.